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Analyzing existing RTC mobile apps from a technical perspective we can appreciate a clear dichotomy in the solutions being used today to maintain the communication channel between the apps and their respective servers to signal messages, calls and any other communication event.

In one side we have those apps maintaining a permanent TCP connection established between the client and the server, this is the case of Skype, TU Me or Google Talk.

In the other side we have those apps not maintaining a permanent TCP connection but using push notifications provided by the operating system (APNS in iOS and GCM in case of Android) to alert the applications of incoming events like messages or calls. This is the case of WhatsApp or Viber.

Just looking at the user experience second group of applications tend to consume less battery (because maintaining a TCP connection usually requires periodic keepalives) and tend to be more reliable (because solutions more tightly integrated with operating syst…